Playing With Fire
by Arquenniel
Summary: A Johnny pulled away from his fans and his car is a very unhappy Johnny. A thief learns this the hard way.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: **I hope this makes you smile!

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**Part 1 of 2**

Everyone knows it's easiest to be invisible in a crowd. But this wasn't a crowd. This was an experiment by some cosmic mad scientist. _Crowd the little humans together, make them excited and talkative, and see if they use up all the oxygen! AH ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!_

It was perfect.

The Bath House was a posh club-spa extending from the first floor of the Exec Hotel. A maze of colorful pools, mini bars, and huge gazebos packed with dancing guests, it was a new hotspot that attracted the hottest people, literally. That is, if the rumors Nia had heard about the Human Torch's normal body temperature were true. The last she'd seen him, he'd been leaning on a railing, a model at each shoulder, grinning his now-famous grin and sipping some decorated drink.

Somewhere in the back of her mind, she wondered if he was hot to the touch. Surely all that heat had to radiate a little bit...

Wearing sleek brown pants, a midnight blue top spangled with silver, and low heels, she was almost underdressed. But she had to be sensible. Here, in the center of one of the wild dancing gazebos, was her workplace and she had to be able to run.

There it was: an older man's bulging back pocket. A wallet, no chain. In the mess of dancing bodies, Nia brushed against him and moved off, leaving him considerably lighter than before. His wallet was warm and soft in her hand, deliciously heavy. She slipped it into her handbag and cruised on. Almost instantly, she spotted another full back pocket and edged closer.

Like picking a penny off the sidewalk.

Someone grabbed her arm. She whirled around, eyes wide. A short man grinned up at her. The huge hibiscus on his shirt glowed in the whirling lights, but his bald pate glowed even brighter.

"Nia honey!" he shouted over the music that was shaking the floorboards.

"Richie, you've gotta stop doing that!" she shouted back.

He grinned, moving fluidly as if dancing. "Lemme hold your hand, babe!"

"Finally!" she clasped his hand. A paper scratched her palm. "I've been waiting for an hour!"

They shook once. "Get you a drink?" Richie asked.

She slipped the paper he'd given her into a handbag. "Sure – but I've gotta powder my nose. Be right back."

Having gone through the planned dialogue, they separated. Exhilarated, Nia made her way out of the gazebo. She was tired of playing Petunia the Petty Pickpocket. Time to pull out Reba the Real Ransacker...forget it. She'd always been bad at alliteration. She liked other people's valuables better.

She slipped along a low wood walkway. On either side, turquoise water sparkled. Candles and flowers bobbed over the surface. Guests swam lazily by, carrying drinks and laughing.

A couple was taking up half the walkway ahead. Taking up the rest of the room was a huge gathering of women. Nia's traitorous eyes fastened on the wallet that nearly hung out the man's back pocket. Irresistible. Tossing a glance about, she fluidly snatched the wallet as she squeezed by. Toss one more glance around as the wallet goes into the handbag. All clear-

_Not_ clear. She didn't believe her eyes until she glanced again, and then her mind emptied of all thought except for a huge _UH-OH_.

Slouched on a bench surrounded by his fans, hair impeccably tousled, sports jacket and button-down shirt mussed to show off his Fantastic Four uniform underneath, Johnny Storm, the Human Torch, locked eyes with her. His lips parted. _You did not just do that_.

Nia's _UH-OH_ was now a more PG-13 word. She lifted one shoulder and simpered. And then, with no other plan, she took off at a brisk walk.

Her self-disgust was cosmic, but it took the back burner. She was too busy wondering if he was following her. After an intense inner argument, she perched on an empty bench and looked back. All she could see was women. Then Storm rose and smilingly began to disentangle himself.

Heart racing, Nia rushed toward the Exec itself, a skyscraper that twisted forty stories into the night sky. At the top of a wide flight of stairs, she took shelter behind a tall potted fern and surveyed the glittering club. For a moment, she felt she was looking at a _Where's Waldo? _book, except in this book, everything moved.

Then she spotted him. He was talking to a yellow-uniformed security guard. Gesturing, _This tall, hair this long..._his hands traced an hourglass and he winked. The guard nodded and spoke into his radio. Nia huffed. Grand. Alert the troops.

Storm's female jungle was reclaiming him, coaxing, twining, _strangling_. He patted the guard on the shoulder and surrendered to his admirers with a grin, practically falling into them. They pulled him away in a glamorous, tanned cloud of perfume.

He'd only reported her. Oh the inadequacy! Nia wasn't worth Johnny Storm's time! But of course she wasn't. A pickpocket wasn't worth the time of a mutant who could turn himself into a comet.

_Where does that fire come from, anyway?_ _Do all his cells have microscopic furnaces? And if that's the case, why isn't he constantly eating to power 50 trillion microfurnaces? Believe me, he'd have to have out-of-this-world cellular respiration. _

Nia wasn't perfectly respectable, but she _had_ paid attention in Biology class. She had considered engraving this fact on her tombstone because it was the only 'good' thing she'd ever accomplished in her life, other than keeping her apartment clean.

She slipped into the hotel and made a beeline for the restrooms across the spacious lobby. Upon entering, she saw a young woman crying in the arms of a friend. Nia froze, and then hurried to the sinks with a mumbled apology. She pulled the hem of her shirt into the sink and ran it under cold water, scrubbing with her fingers. Sharply, she turned the water off and turned around, shirt balled in her hand. "Spill," she lied when the crying woman's friend gave her a glance.

Once in a stall, Nia listened to the girl's quiet sniffling and tried not to sniffle herself. She had been caught. She had brought attention to herself. This was the biggest no-no in the business. And now she had to decide whether to cop out or go on with the plan.

Richie would be mad if she copped out, but she'd done it before. If she did, though, the diamonds would be lost and all their planning...

Deciding, she opened her handbag. Out came a black, longsleeved top with a high collar. It replaced the blue number. She traded her heels for black running shoes, shoved the blue top into her bag, pulled her shoulder-length hair back into a ponytail, and left the restroom and the broken heart inside it.

She crossed the lobby again, watching for yellow uniforms. There were two by the main doors, but their backs were turned. Nia opened a door with a picture of stairs on it, and slipped into a quiet stairwell.

It was easy enough to descend one story and get into the Exec's massive parking garage. Navigating the four levels would be trickier. That was where Richie's little paper came in. Nia pulled it out of her bag and unfolded it.

2, 5, N20

Dodging guards, Nia took the stairs down to the second level, found a pillar with a huge yellow 5, and went to the north end of the row. She counted twenty cars down. It wasn't hard to spot her target in the midst of many high-priced cars. The storm cloud-gray Ascari KZ1 was hard to miss. Brooding, it hunched low to the floor, circular tail lights gleaming like eyes, black chrome wheels flashing. Its lean, carbon-fiber body made it look fast while sitting perfectly still. One almost had to introduce oneself before touching it. Nia just gave it an admiring smile.

She cupped her hands on the driver side window and she peered into the creamy leather interior. Aha. There, on the passenger seat, was a black bag. Quickly, Nia circled around and knelt down next to the passenger door.

The Ascari's owner, a billionaire widower, had rented a necklace of blue diamonds that very afternoon. Nia hoped he wasn't planning on wearing it himself...he probably had a mistress. She also hoped he'd enjoyed possessing the necklace for one evening, because that was as long as he got. It was going to disappear into the underworld tonight.

She just had to get into the car. She'd studied stolen blueprints of the vehicle, and it was a fortress. She pulled out a cloth kit and unrolled it, revealing a glittering array of tools and wires. She cracked her knuckles.

First there was that little security system, the one with an earsplitting alarm. Not too out of the ordinary; a quick rewiring underneath put it to sleep. Of only the car sat a little higher off the concrete...and then, it was dancing with the mechanisms inside the door, thief against designer.

Fifty minutes later, Nia stiffly gathered her scattered tools and slid her kit back into her handbag. She gazed at the Ascari with respect. No other car had ever taken her this long. Of course, having to hide every time a guard went by hadn't helped.

After a thorough look and listen, Nia gently opened the Ascari's door. She had to crouch down to see inside, and it hurt her knees. She inhaled the rich scent of leather and cologne as she plucked the black bag off the seat. It was heavy. She pulled the drawstring loose and it revealed a black leather box. A peek inside thebox – _glitter_. Diamonds. Gorgeous. Gratifying. She tossed the bag back onto the seat and stowed the diamonds in her handbag, flushed with warm success.

Noises echoed suddenly in the cavernous space: a woman's laughter and a man's voice. She jumped up and cracked her head on the inside of the car. She huddled down. Biting back curses, she snatched up her handbag and closed the car door as quietly as she could. There was a pillar in front of the Ascari, and if she could just...keeping low, she scuttled forward-

The black Mercedes McLaren six inches from Nia's ear flashed its lights and gave a piercing squawk. Nia gave a bleat of her own, falling to the cement with a curse. She rolled over and got a first-rate view of the noisy McLaren's license plate: TORCH'D.

Nia would have to be completely stupid to not realize that she was officially in hot water. She crawled a mad dash around the backside of the pillar, quickly coming to her feet. She pressed her back to the pillar, listening.

No more laughter. Just clacking footsteps and the clink of keys. Then the footsteps stopped.

_Just get in the pretty car and drive away, Lover Boy. And take your strangling jungle vines with you. _

"You know," came Johnny Storm's unmistakable low voice, "I really...really..._really_ just want to take these lovely ladies home. But..." yes, he _was _talking to her, coming closer! "...You wanna know what I want to know even more?" She slid away, around the corner. She jammed her hand into her handbag, fingers scrambling past the diamonds and the wallets. "I want to know," he continued, "what the hell you were doing next to my car."

He slid into view mere inches from her shoulder, his brows lowered, his lips tight. Looking up, she met his green-blue eyes for an instant.

"I was admiring it," she croaked. "Surely you can't be against that."

His eyebrows came up. "Oh no, not at all. I like it when a woman has good enough taste to admire a hot set of wheels. What I don't like is when that woman is a pickpocket."

Her breathing was going to fly out of control soon. If only she could think of something good to say...

Nope. Somebody pushed the lever in her brain and all her wits were going, going, gone.

A flash of color made her turn.

The two models stood behind the Ascari, their eyes and teeth gleaming in mocking smiles. Embarrassment joined the whirlwind of emotion and adrenalin pulsing through Nia's veins.

"Get your hand out of the purse," Storm ordered flatly.

Nia yanked her hand out of her bag and shoved a capsule of pepper spray in his face, squeezing the tab. She got a flash of his wide eyes and then his hand flew in front of his face, trailing flames. The spray sizzled.

_Never knew burnt pepper smelled like that_, Nia thought, coughing as she charged the two women. They looked fearsome until they saw the pepper spray in her hand. Then they lunged behind the Ascari, responding to the primal need to preserve their mascara. Nia sprinted off.

Behind her, she heard Storm give a massively irritated sigh. "Take care of my jacket and don't go too far, ladies; I'll be _right_ back."

**Reviews are appreciated! To be continued...**


	2. Chapter 2

**Part 2 of 2**

There was a staircase going up a cement stairwell. Nia took the stairs two at a time, determined to get to ground level. Her steps made the metal staircase vibrate, and she felt it when Storm hit it. Glancing down, she saw him just standing there on the first flight, looking up. He was holding the handrail; it glowed orange around his hand. "Aw, come _on_!" he snapped, a whine in his voice. Then the stairs shook as he began to sprint up after her.

The air quickly became hot and oppressive. She passed the first garage level and kept going. The stairs began to feel mushy beneath her feet, and she smelled burning rubber. She glanced down in horror. He was heating the stairs, and her shoes were melting!

She could see him between the stairs, gaining on her. His shirt was riddled with black holes and he trailed smoke. She was leaving gooey footprints. The soles of her feet were starting to hurt. But a whiff of fresh air gave her hope. She pounded up the last few steps and gained concrete with relief. A long portico lit with yellow lights stretched out before her. A splash of red caught her eye as she flew by: A fire extinguisher in a red box. A glance revealed Storm's head coming up the second-to-last flight. Nia smashed the cover over the box and wrenched the fire extinguisher out.

He was mounting the last flight, the remains of his shirt and designer jeans fluttering away to reveal the sleek Fantastic Four uniform. Patches of it were glowing red, and his eyes were locked on her with predatory determination. He was coming _fast_, almost flying on terrific waves of heat fingering her hair. She scrambled back, pulling the pin out of the fire extinguisher. Douse him or run?

She doused him. In the face. She expected him to blast through the foam and fry her anyway. He reeled instead, choking and throwing his hands up. He caught himself on the railing right before he could tumble backwards.

Shaking, Nia let up and ran.

"You wanna play dirty?" he growled. She glanced back; the foam was sizzling off of him and his teeth were bared in rage. "Then let's play _dirty!_"

The potted plant on her left and the hedge on her right exploded into flame, showering her with dirt. She reeled backward with a shriek. The flames stretched across the portico, making a wall of fire. More flames raced down the hedge, boxing her between flame, wall, and superhero. Superhero who was twenty feet away and closing.

Nia charged the hedge, blasting it with the extinguisher just before she threw herself into it. She'd never felt such heat, and the flash of flames on each side was terrifying. Worse was the expectation that she would feel Storm's hand on her ankle. But velvety green-blue grass awaited on the other side. She landed on it clumsily, fighting not to fall.

She fell anyway.

She heard feet slap the ground behind her and rolled onto her back, extinguisher blasting away at the Human Torch looming over her. Storm roared and pulled a wave of flame into the foam as he scrambled to the left. The flames died and he was forced behind a slender, trembling tree for cover. The tree soon looked like a leg coated in cream ready for a good shave, because Nia couldn't pry her own fingers off the lever. Slowly she became aware of a shout above the hollow hiss of the extinguisher and her own pounding pulse.

"All right, all right! Stop it! _Stop it!_" he was yelling. She could see his hands extended in surrender. "Good one, you got me, now _stop spraying that goop all over!_"

She stopped, and hugged to extinguisher to herself as she shakily came to her feet. She could hear him cursing. He half came out from the shelter of the tree, dripping foam. His hair looked like he'd taken a shower, and streams of foam slid down the contours of his body.

He wiped his face. Instead of revealing the terrible glare from before, his large hands revealed a grin.

Nia stiffened, trying to read the white gleam of his teeth and his crinkled eyes. Was there a maniacal glint to his face? She warily lifted the extinguisher.

He shook his hands off and foam wetly smacked the grass. "Wow, no, that's good." He propped one hand against the tree, wrist-deep in foam. "You're good. Good idea, good plan..." nodding, he flipped his free hand around. And then he cocked his head, smiling with brittle charm. "But I didn't get where I am by letting little girls spray me with water guns."

Suddenly the metal fire extinguisher in her hands turned scalding hot. She dropped it with a cry and looked at him.

He smiled and shrugged, _Whoopsie, did I do that?_

She looked at her burned palms, anger rising.

"They hurt?" Storm asked. "Well that's just a taste of the pain _I'm_ feeling right here," he bumped a fist against his chest, "because I had to leave my girls to chase you down."

"Poor baby," Nia retorted in a quivering voice.

"Watch it." Flames flickered around his fingers.

She glanced around, trying to make a plan. She had no idea why he wanted to chat, but any time he let pass was to her advantage. They were in a corner, hedges on two sides and a seven-foot wall on the other.

She shoved a hand into her purse.

Storm thought this was hilarious. "What - you got a hydrant in there? Wait - wait, I know: a fire engine!"

"No, just…just a lot of wallets. You want them?"

"What do I want?" he asked slyly. "I want an awful lot…you got a phone number?"

Nia felt the urge to start laughing hysterically. Then she saw a flickering out of the corner of her eye and glanced back.

Low flames had formed a half-circle behind her in the grass and were creeping to trap her. She heard Storm curse under his breath as she hurled her purse at him and ran for the second hedge, hurdling the flames. As she threw herself over the scratchy branches she waited for them to ignite, but they didn't. So she released the diamond case she'd pulled from her purse into the hedge and then tumbled off.

She landed hard on her side and got a good view of a large, rectangular pool with chairs and tables around it. It was empty. And at 1:30 am, this was no surprise.

A roar came over the hedge and she looked up in time to see her pursuer blaze neatly over the hedge. As he landed, she heaved herself into a fast roll. Over and over and over and over and _drop_ right into the water. It was a cold shock. She kicked herself upright, pushing off the side at the same time. She also choked and coughed up the gulp of chlorinated water she'd swallowed. Her nose started to run and she tasted blood in the back of her throat.

Grand, she'd landed in the deep end.

Johnny Storm knelt down at the edge of the pool and watched her tread water. The brilliant color of the water was reflected in his eyes. "Way to think on your...side," he gave her a cheesy smile.

She edged away, breathing hard.

"Nice stroke there," Storm said graciously. "Very smooth. You like water? I do too. Especially hot tubs." With a suggestive smile, he dripped one hand into the water. The water boiled around his fingertips.

She was now two-thirds of the way across.

He took his hand out of the water and gave her a sympathetic look. "Treading water is hard, isn't it? It really drags at your arms, and then your quads start to scream..."

She cursed him under her breath and it made him smile.

He stood suddenly and began to walk around the end of the pool. Nia stopped edging and watched him. "I remember when I had to tread water for five minutes, when I was a teenybopper." He gazed off nostalgically. "My swim instructor was smoking hot and I was so afraid I'd disappoint her." Now he was ambling around to her side. Seething, she was forced back the way she'd come.

"That was before I became a pilot," he told her as he knelt down again. "Then I was treading for ten minutes or more." He swiped some foam off his hair. "Does this stuff make me look funny? Maybe I should take a bath…"

He tumbled into the water.

Nia's inner Olympian swimmer came alive with a vengeance. She threw herself toward the side, stroking for all she was worth. Storm was splashing a lot behind her, probably washing the foam out of his hair. _Vain matchbox brain_, she thought venomously as she grabbed the side and began to pull herself up with shaking arms.

"Going so soon?" A warm arm hooked her waist and pulled her right back in. She found herself released immediately, drifting back from the side. Then Storm had her wrist and was towing her toward a metal ladder. She flailed and kicked and clawed and choked on warm water, but his grip was like iron.

"Would you stop it?" he snapped as he grabbed the ladder with one hand. Immediately the metal began to glow and Nia's exhausted struggles became more focused on staying afloat as drips of molten metal slid toward the water.

"Observe the master at work," Storm said, in a fake deep voice. Hooking one leg around the ladder underwater, he grabbed the biggest drip of metal and pulled it under the waves in a looping motion. Steam flew up, acrid with chlorine. "Phew!" he waved the fumes away and then waited for a moment.

He shoved her hand through the metal loop he had formed. She struggled and he pushed her against the side of the pool, pinning her with one shoulder. Heat blossomed from his fingertips. He melted the bottom of the loop, tightening it just enough that it didn't burn her.

"Now." He let her float free. She yanked, but her wrist was trapped. "Don't go anywhere, sweetheart." He began to climb up the ladder, but then he froze and splashed back in. His hand caught her shoulder and she was pinned again and he was glaring at her.

"What were you doing next to my car?" he demanded.

"Paying it no attention," she said meekly. "Didn't even touch it. Pickpocket's word."

"Then what were you doing?"

The water was heating up, too much. She began to feel dizzy. "I don't-I don't-"

"You're a girl and I like to treat girls right," he said sharply. "But I might forget."

"I was…just walking!" Nia scrabbled for ideas. "Wait. Why are you sticking around? You got me! Go get the police. Then you can take your girls home. Not that your sister would let you, though…"

"Come again?" He cocked his head sharply, eyes taking an even more dangerous cast.

"I saw the scene after your dirt bike fiasco. I bet your sister even keeps you on a curfew."

The temperature of the water went up even more. "You know what?" Storm said in an ominously soft voice. "I think…" he moved so close his eyes were all she could see and the heat was unbearable, "I think you're right. I should go and take my girls someplace where we can have fun. You're just a petty thief."

His breath fanned over her face once and then he released her and climbed out of the pool, streaming water. "If you did hurt my car, I'll just tell your jail keepers to feed you lima beans. Forever."

"I love lima beans," Nia called defiantly.

"Whatever." Instead of walking away, he circled to the hedge, scooping up her purse. Nia's eyes widened.

He poked around the hedge and then turned around with a loud _Ah HA!_ In his hand was the diamond case. He peeked inside and his head came up. His eyes were huge. "These are real. You stole a _necklace_? Wait. Wait." He marched around to her. "Did you lift these from the Ascari?"

She just glared up at him.

"Wait." He dug into her bag and pulled out her kit. Unrolling it, his eyes went wide again. "You did, didn't you." His voice rose. "You did! You broke into an _Ascari_! Holy-" he turned away, hand to head, and whirled back around. "I shouldn't've been so careful not to burn you!"

"What, is this about the diamonds or the car?"

"You _DID! _An _Ascari_!" He threw everything down and grabbed the ladder again, melting it.

"What?" Nia shouted. "Cars aren't sacred!"

He made an outraged noise. Three minutes later, Nia's free wrist was trapped in its ownmakeshift shackle and she was glaring miserably at him as he gathered up her things.

"An Ascari," he muttered to himself. "You're getting a nice long stay in the slammer."

"So glad you care," she retorted.

His eyes narrowed. They took on a wicked glint. He slowly set her things down and knelt, putting his face inches from hers. "Try not to dream about me while you're in maximum security, sweetheart." He stroked her cheekbone with one hot finger. "Don't want you coming after me when they let you out. If they ever do."

"Won't be a problem," she said sweetly.

He raised a knowing eyebrow. "Liar." He rose, re-gathered her things, and strolled off. "The police'll love me for this."

"Wait!" Nia huffed at herself, wondering why she was asking him to wait. "Come back, Matchbox Brain!"

He lifted a hand without turning. "Nothin' doin', Ditzy."

She gaped. "Who's ditzy, Lover Boy?"

"Please stop trying to undermine my self esteem," he was nearing a corner. "I can't take it, okay?"

"Faulty Sparkler! Flame Ears! _You've still got foam in your hair!_"

"Shut up!" he bellowed, and disappeared around the corner.

"I'm sure your girls'll love your _eau de fire extinguisher_," she muttered angrily, staring at the spot where he'd disappeared.

Soon she heard running footsteps approaching. That would be the cops. And this would be humiliating.

Richie would get her out. He was one of the richest men in town. He'd be angry with her for failing, but he would get her out. He always did. He'd even buy her a new kit.

And then she'd be visiting Dale. He had blueprints for all sorts of cars...

Including Mercedes McLarens.

**Thanks so much for reading! Any thoughts?**


End file.
